till called for
by justjoy
Summary: "I've heard that voice before," said Holmes, staring down the dimly lit street. "Now, I wonder who the deuce that could have been." – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Scandal in Bohemia [for CoAi / ShinShi week day 3 – Black Organisation, alternative first meeting.]
1. initiation

for CoAi / ShinShi week day 3 – Black Organisation, alternative first meeting – by pairingweeks-dcmk on tumblr.

* * *

 _"I've heard that voice before," said Holmes, staring down the dimly lit street.  
"Now, I wonder who the deuce that could have been."_

* * *

And it had been such a great day right until then, too, Shinichi couldn't help but think as he knelt to examine the body where the Mystery Coaster staff had laid it out on the floor.

He could feel a faint tremor running through Ran's usually steady hands where she held onto him, her breath hitching once on a sob. Not crying, then, but still horrified, though he thought there was a good chance that the tears would catch up later.

An understandable reaction, Shinichi supposed, though not one he'd ever shared. (Which probably said something about him, but that was beside the point.)

It had to be said, though – even with all the variously mangled bodies that he'd seen, this particular manner of death probably ranked among the more gruesome ones, if for nothing else but the sheer shock value of actually witnessing firsthand the burst of arterial spray from what had otherwise been a very clean decapitation.

 _Too_ clean, in fact, and given the complete lack of the usual tool marks that one would expect around such a wound…

He stood, moving to check the victim's seat. Any accident with enough force to cause such a decapitation was almost certain to have caused some damage to the roller coaster itself – but there was barely a scratch left on the bright yellow paint, let alone a visible dent.

A murder, then.

Shinichi was about to announce as much when a hubbub rose behind them, and he turned to see the portly figure of Megure approaching, displaying his badge to clear a path among the crowd of curious onlookers who'd gathered to gawk at the scene.

The inspector's expression brightened visibly, and Shinichi returned his hearty greeting in kind – Megure was quickly becoming a far more familiar figure than most of Shinichi's teachers at Teitan High, after all, since this was already the third time they were meeting at a crime scene in this week alone.

(Contrary to what Division One and most of the Tokyo metropolitan police apparently thought, Shinichi _was_ aware of the sheer ridiculousness of the rate at which he'd been running into murders over the past few years, especially since that first airplane case.

Of course, there were quite a number of cases where he'd been called in by Megure after the fact, but the majority simply happened to occur wherever he was at the moment, which was… a _statistically improbable_ fraction of the total number of homicides that occurred annually in Tokyo, to say the least.

He'd been able to solve every last one of them, though, which was what really mattered in the end.)

Megure waved the forensic techs over to the scene as Shinichi gave him a quick rundown of the facts, and he agreed that it was murder, rounding up the five suspects – the victim's three companions, and the two people who'd been sitting in the last row of the coaster.

Shinichi knew the first three from briefly meeting them earlier, and had already seen the latter pair in the queue, though he hadn't really studied them beyond nothing the oddness of their attire, especially for amusement park visitors.

Both were dressed almost entirely in black, the man in a hat and suit that only served to emphasise his large build, while the woman wore a dark turtleneck under a black coat that contrasted sharply with her blonde hair. Neither had made any fuss about the murder so far, even when they'd been included in the list of suspects, though the man's face showed alarm that wasn't reflected on hers.

In fact, Shinichi noted with interest, she was sweeping her gaze over the scene even as the man said something urgently to her, analysing it methodically much as he himself was, looking –

– right at him, suddenly, gaze startling and sharp.

Shinichi couldn't help a brief chill at the utterly detached calm he saw there. It was not cruelty, not by a long shot, but there was no warmth there either, in her stance or expression.

Who _was_ she, he wondered, but then a shout went up when a knife was found in the girlfriend's bag, and Shinichi put those thoughts aside in favour of examining the evidence.

He crouched beside the handbag, picking up the knife and the blood-stained handkerchief it had been wrapped in, possibilities running through his head. This couldn't be the murder weapon, it simply wasn't _possible_ to sever a man's neck with this, but then – how else could it have been done?

"3,000 Newtons."

Only long practice of handling crime scene evidence stopped Shinichi from dropping the knife at the sudden voice from his left.

He looked up to see the woman in black standing several paces away, though she was looking straight ahead at the coaster, not him – from this distance he could tell that the turtleneck she was wearing wasn't actually black, but a shade of scarlet so dark it might as well have been. (Which was just as well, Shinichi couldn't help but think, since he was certain that she'd been sitting right behind the victim, so at least _some_ of the blood from the decapitation had to have gotten onto her clothes.)

"The minimum force required to fracture the cervical spine," she continued. "A trained martial artist like that karate black belt friend of yours might've been able to exert that much, but to do something like this…"

Shinichi set the knife back down carefully and stood. "How do you know about Ran?"

"It's not only your business to know things, Kudo-kun." She paused. "Though I didn't do it, in case you're wondering."

"I didn't think you did," Shinichi answered honestly.

"Oh?" She smiled faintly, glancing at him. "Why, do I not look capable of murder to you?"

"You'd go for something cleaner." That bit was obvious, if nothing much else about her was. "This was messy. Personal."

"You're not wrong, I suppose." She turned, looking to where Megure was ordering the officer to detain the girlfriend. "Though I'd appreciate it if you could wrap the case up quickly, my associate and I have somewhere else to be."

"Didn't need you to tell me that," Shinichi muttered before striding forward to stop Megure and accuse the gymnast – who protested, just as he'd expected.

It was only after he'd finished the entire deduction that he noticed that the woman in black was already gone.

Well. He didn't think he'd ever see her again anyway.

.

The sun was already starting to set by the time Shinichi began to walk home with Ran, who was still wiping at her eyes.

He was comforting her (or trying to, at least, though it wasn't looking very successful) when he spotted a movement out the corner of his eye – the black-clad man from earlier, who looked around in a distinctly suspicious manner before disappearing down a small alley between two buildings.

Shinichi didn't even hesitate before running after him, telling Ran to head home first. Taking out his handphone, he switched the camera to night scene mode as he followed the man to the base of the Ferris wheel, and it paid off as he snapped several photos that showed the blackmail deal clearly – digital photos weren't the best form of evidence in court due to the relative ease of doctoring them, but coupled with his eyewitness testimony it would surely be enough –

There was barely time to turn around at the soft footstep behind him, muffled as it was by the grass.

"That will be quite enough, meitantei-san," said a distinctly familiar voice, but Shinichi didn't have time to place it before he felt an arm wrapped around his neck from behind, and another hand holding a cloth over his nose and mouth.

He instinctively held his breath as he tried to fight off the chokehold, but it was too late, the cloyingly sweet taste of the drug already at the back of his throat –

.

Shinichi opened his eyes to find himself propped up into a sitting position, back against the wall he'd been hiding behind.

The woman in black from earlier – he _knew_ he'd recognised her voice, damn it – stood several paces away, regarding him with the same dispassionate calm that she'd had at the crime scene earlier.

"I was hoping it wouldn't come to this," she said in an almost reproving manner. "Why _must_ you insist on sticking your nose into other people's business, Kudo-kun?"

Shinichi tried to answer _I'm a detective, that's my job_ and _well if you'd wanted no one to notice then you ought to have asked your subordinate to do a better job of being stealthy_ (because that's how it was, she was obviously in charge here despite the man having at least fifteen years on her) but all that came out was a garbled string of sounds.

He grimaced, his mouth feeling almost rubbery in its refusal to move as he wanted it to. Damn drugs.

Shinichi thought his meaning must've mostly gotten through anyway, because she sighed and shook her head.

(What had her name even been? Shinichi didn't know – he hadn't been listening when the officers took down their details earlier, though he was now starting to think that whatever answer she'd given was unlikely to have been her real name anyway.)

"Before you complain, let me reassure you that I have drugs that can do far, far worse than this," she said, moving forward to sit down on the grass opposite him. "That was chloroform, by the way, with some modifications of my own to alter the side effects. Including a mild muscle paralytic, as I'm sure you're starting to realise, but you shouldn't be getting the usual migraine afterwards."

Shinichi levelled a withering glare at her that communicated his distinct lack of gratefulness at this development – the migraines he'd gotten after the few times he'd been knocked out with chloroform were a pain, true, but he'd much rather to not have been drugged in the first place.

She ignored him. "This is what will happen. You're going to come quietly back with us, without trying any of the heroics I'm sure you're very fond of."

"Why should I go with you?" Shinichi managed to say around the cottony numbness in his mouth.

"Your friend... Mouri Ran-san, was it?" She paused, though not long enough for him to answer. "I'd hate to meet her under more _unfortunate_ circumstances."

It wasn't even much of a threat by most standards, but Shinichi remembered with a slow creeping horror their conversation at the Mystery Coaster earlier, and the flash of anger felt like it was burning away the remnants of the drug in his veins. "Don't you _dare_ hurt Ran."

"Believe it or not, I don't want to. So don't make me."

She sounded sincere – but just about anyone could if they tried hard enough, he'd learned that all too well, and her expression was almost unreadable in the dark shadow of the wall.

Shinichi tried anyway, forcing his eyes to focus, to search for even the slightest hint of deception in what was visible of her features – and she let him, sitting in what he could almost have sworn was an amused silence before she finally stood several minutes later.

(He wondered briefly if it was her patience or the muscle paralytic that was wearing thin, though he strongly suspected it was the latter.)

She held out a hand to him. "Do we have a deal, Kudo-kun?"

Shinichi didn't move to take it, instead tilting his head back a little to meet her gaze as he spoke. "What's your name?"

It had partly been to stall – his words had come out quite clearly, which meant that he'd been correct about the paralytic, good – but Shinichi felt oddly gratified to hear what was definitely a muted huff of laughter from her.

"What, will we be exchanging phone numbers next?" she retorted, sarcasm clear as day. "And why do you think that I'd give you a real name, anyway?"

"I don't," Shinichi answered honestly, with a shrug. "Unless you'd prefer me to keep calling you the 'woman in black', though..."

She blinked. Twice.

"Seriously?" She sighed. "Let me assure you, Kudo-kun, that my usual choice in clothes is considerably better than your taste in names. And you can call me Sherry. That's – "

" – your codename, I suppose. And you're sure that I'm the one who's terrible at naming things here?" Shinichi flexed his fingers slightly, holding back a wince at returning sensation of pins and needles. "Do you call yourselves the Bar in Black? Or the Liquor Cabinet?"

The woman – _Sherry_ , he corrected himself – gave him a look that was part amusement and mostly irritation, before pointedly extending her hand to him again. "If you would, Kudo-kun? I know full well that you're stalling."

"Or you'll kill me?" he asked, the question mostly rhetorical, and it was her turn to shrug, with a nonchalance that suggested she would also hide the body where no one would be able to find it.

Probably more successfully than most of the murderers he'd encountered, too, Shinichi thought as he reached out to take her hand. "And here I was, thinking that you might be reluctant to do it, now that we're acquainted and all."

Sherry pulled him up easily – she was stronger than she looked, he noted with some surprise, and the faint pattern of callouses on her hand suggested regular handgun use – and motioned for him to walk between the two of them before she responded. "Hardly. I think it's only made the option rather more attractive, in fact."

Shinichi spluttered in indignation.

* * *

 **END...?**

* * *

...uh. this was written (or at least intended) as part of a much longer WIP that's been in my drafts for quite a while, but then I saw the literally perfect prompt and couldn't resist finishing up this bit to post. so there maaaaaay be more (with some semblance of plot even, gasp) where this came from, eventually? if I ever get around to working on the rest, that is.

anyway – this isn't as thoroughly edited as usual, but hope y'all enjoyed! it's kind of a reversal of my other fic (terra incognita, not intentionally though), and proof of the fact that I am apparently incapable of writing anything serious featuring these two without it devolving into snarky semi-crack at some point.

quote and title from ASiB (where else) because we all know I can't title to save my life otherwise.


	2. escalation

_*peeks out from behind a conveniently-placed wall* ...uh. this has literally been sitting around half-written forever, and since I'm clearing out my WIPs (a long and arduous process, I assure you), have at it, if anyone's still interested in this verse anymore?_

 _(also this is entirely not as serious or well-planned as you would expect from a blackmail plot because the author is Very Bad at stuff like that, consider yourself warned)_

* * *

 _"It was all-important. When a woman thinks that her house is on fire, her instinct is at once to rush to the thing which she values most. It is a perfectly overpowering impulse, and I have more than once taken advantage of it."_

* * *

Shinichi was _bored_.

He'd never dealt well with boredom, and he certainly wasn't now that he had none of his usual distractions to occupy him, or even – horror of horrors – the day's worth of ridiculously simple schoolwork to finish.

His hands itched for a Holmes novel to read yet again, if not the cold case files from Megure that he'd left lying on the large table in the study that his father usually used for writing.

So he was pacing, up and down the length of the lab – which was surprisingly spacious, given that he hadn't seen anyone else so much as enter the place all day – because even Shinichi wasn't mad enough to try kicking anything around in here, not with the amount of glassware occupying every other table.

(Well, not that he had a soccer ball with him at the moment, but then again Shinichi had never run into problems with finding substitutes when the situation called for it.)

The sound was annoying, he knew, but Shinichi didn't feel particularly like being considerate at the moment, and it was at least working off some of his energy from being having been cooped up in here since this morning –

"Either you stop pacing and sit down," snapped Sherry - it still felt odd to think of her by that name, but he hadn't heard anyone address her otherwise. To the contrary, the name almost seemed to be a privilege of sorts, though she'd blithely answered _need not to know_ when he'd asked her about it. "Or I make you my first human test subject whether you like it or not. How does Mouri-san stand dealing with you?"

"What _are_ you developing that drug for, anyway?" Shinichi asked right back, genuinely curious.

(He'd snuck a peek at some of her notes when she'd left the room briefly earlier, of course, though the glare she'd thrown him after returning suggested that she was more than aware of this fact. Not that they'd made much sense to him at all, frankly speaking, beyond suggesting that Sherry - whatever her real name was - probably held a PhD in some field of biochemistry and knew very well what she was doing.)

"I could tell you, of course, but then I'd have to kill you." She didn't even look up from where she was carefully adding several annotations in the margins of her notebook as she answered. "Which wouldn't be too difficult, but I suppose it would be a shame, since you've proved to be at least somewhat intelligent company."

…she sounded perfectly serious about it, too.

 _Should've seen that coming_ , Shinichi grumbled internally with a sigh, sitting down reluctantly on a nearby stool. "You're the worst kidnapper ever. At least let me use the internet, will you?"

"I'm not even going to enquire about your apparent experiences with being kidnapped." Sherry gave him the most unimpressed expression he'd seen on her so far. "And while I might not have planned for this, Kudo-kun, I'm not so daft as to allow you access to the internet."

Shinichi decided to switch tactics. "Alright. A big criminal organisation like this, you've got to have surveillance of some sort on the Tokyo police, right? Division One, at the very least?"

This time, she did pause in her work before answering. "You want to solve cases from _illegal_ surveillance of the Metropolitan Police?"

Shinichi shrugged. "I'd say this is a case of the ends justifying the means, don't you think?"

"…I think you have a rather unconventional sense of morality, Kudo-kun," she answered finally, taking off her gloves before she opened a drawer and pulled out a laptop.

Shinichi waited while she typed something before handing it to him, the screen showing - as he'd expected - the Metropolitan Police's intranet portal, opened to a page listing currently open homicide cases in Tokyo.

"I've only enabled access to the MPD databases, and it's read-only. Try anything else and – "

"Yeah, you'll kill me." Shinichi waved vaguely in her direction, attention already on Division One's caseload list. "I get it."

He felt her watching with some interest as he opened one of the open cases that Chiba and the older Takagi were in charge of - a robbery-homicide, from the looks of it. "What do you plan to do with your deductions, anyway?"

"Send an anonymous tip to Megure-keibu, perhaps." Shinichi turned to her, raising an eyebrow. "Unless you're going to stop me from doing that."

"Far be it for me to stand in the way of justice, o great detective," she said in an entirely deadpan tone, and Shinichi couldn't help but snicker.

This was turning out to be a reasonably enjoyable kidnapping after all, he supposed.

.

It happened on the afternoon of the third day.

They'd settled into a sort of tentative routine, strange as the situation was - Shinichi worked on cases while Sherry (he still hadn't managed to get any other name from her yet) continued… whatever it was that she was working on, which Shinichi still hadn't gotten any closer to figuring out, frustratingly enough.

Frustration was becoming something of a common theme in his life lately, Shinichi couldn't help but think. He'd been stuck on the same case for the past three hours, looking through Takagi's case notes (painstakingly detailed as usual, though he'd missed several points that Shinichi himself would've looked into) and crime scene photos until he was starting to feel mildly cross-eyed from staring at the screen.

It hadn't even looked like a difficult case, at first - all the evidence at the scene pointed unquestionably to murder, most probably someone silencing a witness who'd just been there at the wrong place and time.

Except for one problem: the cause of death.

Or rather, the lack thereof.

It was considerably more difficult to investigate a homicide - let alone narrow down the list of suspects - when you couldn't even establish _how_ the victim had died, and…

Shinichi made an inarticulate noise of exasperation. People didn't just _drop dead_ for no reason, that just didn't happen, but both the autopsy and tox screen had turned up nothing suspicious. He couldn't even find a hint, any suggestion of something the coroner might've missed.

"Problem, Kudo-kun?"

Shinichi glanced up to find Sherry looking at him from across the lab bench, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at the muted amusement in the scientist's tone as he turned the laptop to face her. "You tell me."

"Well, I'm not – " _a detective_ , Shinichi had been sure she was about to say, except her voice cut off, expression darkening visibly as she scrolled through the case notes.

"Coroner and toxicology reports, _now,_ " Sherry snapped in a tone of such urgency that he reached over to open the files without objection. Her lips thinned as she skimmed through those as well, and finally she closed the laptop and pushed it back over to him.

"I know what killed him," she said before he could ask. "And most probably - "

Whatever she'd been about to say next was lost as she abruptly shoved her stool back and hurried back to the bench where she'd been working, her face going pale.

Shinichi stood as well. "What - "

Sherry didn't even let him finish the question, pointing at the door to the storage room connected to the lab. "Hide, and don't come back out until I tell you to."

Shinichi opened his mouth to protest, and she pinned him with a glare. "If you value your continued existence, Kudo-kun, I suggest you do as I say. _Immediately_."

Then there was sound of footsteps coming from outside the lab, and both of them froze for a moment.

" _Go,_ " she hissed fiercely, and Shinichi crossed the room and closed the door of the storage room behind him just as the lab door opened.

The storage room door was thick enough that Shinichi couldn't make out the words of the conversation outside, but still he moved as quietly as he could towards the only good hiding spot he could see in the room - the row of tall lockers at the back.

The first two were locked, but the third locker opened noiselessly - it had been unused for a while, judging from the layer of dust, but that also meant it was empty, and Shinichi fit himself inside, pulling the door closed.

He'd been inside for several minutes - he wasn't sure how many, exactly, but long enough for his eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness - when the door to the storage room swung open.

" - if you insist, Gin," Sherry was saying, her voice somehow much more even than it'd been earlier, and if it was enforced calm she was certainly doing a very good job of faking it. "Though I don't know what you expect to find here."

Shinichi couldn't see from inside the locker, but the footsteps suggested two others had followed Sherry into the room, though only one spoke - the man named Gin, presumably. "You seem… _tense_ , Sherry. I wonder why that is?"

"Do you really think I'm hiding anything, Gin?" Sherry's voice matched Gin's in its coolness. "Haven't I at least earned that much trust, after all that I've done for the Organisation?"

Gin made a wordless noise of contempt, as if his opinion of _trust_ was too low for even words – even with only his voice to go on, it wasn't difficult to for Shinichi to imagine at all. "It certainly wouldn't be the first time one of you Miyano sisters tried something of the sort."

"I assure you, any anxiety I have only concerns seeing you out of my lab and getting back to work," Sherry said over the increasingly loud sound of footsteps - they were walking towards where he was hiding, Shinichi thought with mounting dread, and then Gin was going to _find him_ -

One pair of footsteps stopped, just paces away from the locker he was in - Sherry's, judging from how her voice was barely muffled by the thin metal. "I will _not_ have three weeks' worth of research wasted just because of your overblown paranoia, Gin. Even _that person_ wouldn't be happy about that. You know how important my work is to him."

Gin and the other person slowed to a stop as well, though neither spoke for a while.

"You know what they say about all work and no play, Sherry," Gin said finally, in a tone that made the hairs on the back of Shinichi's neck stand on end.

"And you are well aware of my opinions regarding your particular brand of _recreational activity_ , Gin," Shiho snapped back in response, and if her tone had been frigid before it was absolutely arctic now. "Now leave."

And Shinichi very carefully did _not_ breathe a sigh of relief as three sets of footsteps faded into the distance.

He pushed the locker door slightly ajar, listening for several minutes before stepping back out, flinching slightly at the sudden brightness of the lab.

Sherry was alone in the room - what he could see of her expression seemed calm enough, but her hands told a different story, fingers clenched so tight around one of the stirring rods that Shinichi was actually afraid the glass might break.

She didn't turn as he approached her, gaze still fixed on the lab bench in front of her. "I told you to wait before coming back out, didn't I?"

Shinichi ignored her words, instead sitting down across the bench from her. "That man, Gin… he called you one of the Miyano sisters."

"So you heard that," she murmured, before letting out a small sigh. "Miyano Shiho. That's my name."

So he finally knew her real name, Shinichi thought, though he felt no victory in the knowledge. "And your sister?"

"Akemi-neesan…" there was a hint of worry in her voice now, under the thrumming tension. "Gin wouldn't have mentioned her without a reason. Perhaps those rumours weren't so baseless after all."

"What rumours?" he asked, and Shiho eyed him consideringly for a while before telling him - not everything, Shinichi thought, but considerably more than she'd probably told anyone else.

They sat in silence for a while after she'd finished, though she broke it a while later.

"You're fortunate, Kudo-kun. It was almost Gin instead of me at Tropical Land that day. Suffice to say, if that'd been the case, you probably wouldn't be breathing right now."

Shinichi grimaced in agreement. Though… "That still doesn't explain why you brought me here to start with."

"Well, you did see the deal, after all, and the Organisation is not in the habit of leaving witnesses to walk free. Besides…" Shiho paused, spinning a pen between her fingers absently. "I researched a list of people who might be able and willing to help onee-san escape. It wasn't a long list, and your name was on it."

Several things clicked into place in Shinichi's mind. "Is that why you approached me at the Mystery Coaster?"

At her nod, he sighed. "You could've just asked me directly, you know. I would've helped."

"Yes, well, I wasn't counting on you having such a dismal sense of self-preservation." Shiho countered, and Shinichi is almost relieved to hear her customary sarcasm resurfacing. "This isn't the first time I've thought about getting her out. They wouldn't dare to harm me, but onee-san… ever since _that_ \- " there was a brief, bitter twist to Shiho's expression, and she shook her head. "It doesn't matter. They have reason to doubt her loyalty now, and I don't think even our connection will be enough to keep her safe for much longer. You heard for yourself how paranoid Gin is."

 _Not to mention his strange obsession with you,_ Shinichi thought but didn't say. "Have you ever considered FBI witness protection?"

And there it was, again - the flicker of something (anger, he thought, but couldn't be sure) across her expression at his words. There was a story behind that, and Shinichi was tempted to ask what it was, though he managed to stop himself.

"Even if they agreed to help us… the Organisation is bigger than you can imagine, Kudo-kun. Yes, even overseas," she added at his look of doubt.

"So you need cover identities. Disguises." His mother would've been able to handle that, Shinichi thought, except that he had absolutely no idea where either of his parents were at the moment and no reliable means of contacting them undetected. "I don't suppose there's anyone in this place who might be willing to help?"

"Out of the question," Shiho answered immediately, her voice terse. "The only disguise expert we have would sooner kill me personally than so much as lift a finger in my aid - _why_ are you smiling like that, Kudo-kun?"

"I have an idea," Shinichi said slowly. "Would you happen to have access to Division Two's files as well?"

* * *

 **TBC...?**

* * *

 _wonder what he's planning, eh_

 _...as mentioned earlier, if you were looking for a plotty fic, apologies but this is very much Not It? this verse mostly exists because of my unending love for these two tbh._

 _anyway if you're wondering, yes there are more parts to this, I just have genuinely zero idea how finished they are (it's been... a while? idk), mea culpa_


	3. desistance

_third and final chapter of the main arc, epilogue to be posted shortly._

* * *

 _The photograph was of Irene Adler herself in evening dress, the letter was superscribed to "Sherlock Holmes, Esq. To be left till called for."_

* * *

"This is, without a doubt, the stupidest plan you've ever had," Shiho said, voice making it abundantly clear that she was questioning her decision to go along with it.

"Give me a break, you've only known me for less than a week," Shinichi retorted, attempting to sound significantly more confident than he felt.

Shiho only treated him to another unamused stare as she again tried to muss up his hair, which valiantly resisted the attempt, going right back to its usual cowlick once she took her hand away.

Finally she sighed, rolling her eyes in resigned annoyance before grabbing a baseball cap out of her bag ("I don't even _like_ baseball!" "Grin and bear it, Kudo-kun.") and setting it on his head.

The plan (insofar as it could be _called_ a plan, because Shiho was right, it was terrible and Shinichi couldn't even begin to list the number of ways this could go wrong) started off fairly simple, relatively speaking – meet Akemi for lunch, and convince her not to go through with whatever it was the Organisation had planned for her.

That went off without too much of a hitch.

Miyano Akemi was nothing like the person Shinichi had been expecting. She reminded him somewhat of Ran, actually, which made him wonder how the two sisters could possibly be related, polar opposites as they were.

It turned out that Gin had made her a deal – a billion yen heist in exchange for allowing both of them to go free – that stank of a trap of some sort, and judging from Akemi's expression she'd been well aware that of the possibility but had been determined to go through with it anyway.

(Shiho had paled when she'd heard Akemi talk about the deal, and Shinichi had tried to tune out the rest of their conversation, feeling oddly like he was intruding on a private matter.)

In the end, though, Akemi had accepted the alternative that they proposed. Which was fortunate, because Shinichi was already grasping at straws here - his forte was solving mysteries, not creating them, especially when he didn't have access to his usual contacts.

Of course, no sooner had Akemi had left the cafe than a high pitched scream pierced the air.

Shinichi was on his feet before he even fully realised it, and only Shiho's quick but unyielding grip on his arm prevented him from moving any further.

"What do you think you're _doing_?" she snapped at him.

"Someone probably just found a dead body."

"You don't know that."

"I do." _It always is_ , Shinichi would've added, except then another person screamed about a dead body and made it a moot point.

"You can't be serious," Shiho muttered under her breath, exasperated. "I don't suppose I could convince you to leave it to the police?"

"No such luck," he confirmed, and she huffed in deep annoyance. "Look, we're far enough from Beika that the police probably won't recognise me on sight. And as long as I avoid giving the deductions like I usually do… unless you want to come along and help?"

He could see the exact moment when his words registered – Shiho shook her head empathically before letting his arm go. "Fine then, go play detective all you like, I'm not joining you."

"Too late," he informed her cheerfully, flipping his grip to pull her by the hand towards where the body lay, over the sound of her protests. "Time for your first case, tantei-san!"

.

The wind on the rooftop was bitingly cold, so Shinichi found the least exposed spot – the corner between the roof access and the ventilation unit – as he waited to put part two of the plan into motion.

Shiho had still been annoyed at him when they'd split up after leaving the cafe three hours ago, despite the fact that the case had been solved without anyone realising his identity. Though that had been mostly thanks to her concocting a plausible story on the spot when the investigating detective had asked them who they were, along with false names that Shinichi had kept tripping up on, until she'd pulled him aside and whispered dire threats if he didn't get his – literal – act together.

She'd figured out the exact cause of death before he had, too: thallium poisoning, which Shinichi had read about before but never actually encountered on a case until now.

("Maybe you should really become a detective," he'd said only half-jokingly to her as they were leaving.

Shiho had looked at him for a long moment before answering. "The truth isn't something I particularly care for, Kudo-kun."

She'd refused to elaborate further, though, so he'd had to leave it at that.)

Shinichi was starting to regret not stopping to buy some hot coffee on the way here when the roof access door finally swung open quietly on well-oiled hinges, and a white-clad figure emerged onto the roof.

Kaitou Kid crossed half the length of the roof before stopping, though Shinichi didn't doubt that the thief had already known he was there the whole time.

Kid spoke without turning around. "Quite the unexpected development, meitantei. To whom do I owe this pleasure?"

"Nakamori-keibu doesn't know I'm here, if that's what you're asking. I'd prefer if it was kept that way." Shinichi took a slip of paper out of his own pocket, holding it out to Kid. "I came to ask a favour, actually."

Kid glanced over at his words, and Shinichi thought he saw a hint of surprise there, though it was difficult to know for sure, with the light of the full moon throwing the shadow of Kid's hat brim across most of his features.

To Shinichi's surprise, the note vanished from his fingers with a puff of smoke before reappearing in Kid's own. "An address? And what should I expect to find there, I wonder?"

"Two people who could use your help," Shinichi answered, his mind already racing. (The clocktower heist had been an impressive demonstration to start with, now that Shinchi knew who he'd been up against back then, but witnessing Kaitou Kid's tricks firsthand was quite something else altogether – _how_ had the thief managed that with two metres of intervening space between them?)

"I imagine that you aren't referring to my less legal skillset, so… disguises, I assume?" Kid asked.

Shinichi shrugged noncommittally – it was true, but there was no need to give up the information when he still couldn't be certain that Kid would actually help. (This was the riskiest part of the plan, really, but since Shiho remained adamant about staying away from the Organisation's disguise expert, he'd decided to take a chance on Kid after recalling his disguise from the heist.)

"I'll take that as a yes," Kid said with some amusement. "Friends of yours?"

Shinichi chuckled dryly, and couldn't help but imagine Shiho's response to that question. "Not at all. Will you come?"

"A mysterious invitation, hand-delivered… how could I resist?" Kid grinned, and the note vanished again, failing to reappear this time. "Though I do hope this isn't an ambush of some sort, meitantei, that'd be horribly disappointing. Not to mention rude."

"No handcuffs, promise." Shinichi's words were punctuated by the thunder of the Task Force's footsteps echoing up the ventilation unit.

"And that's the cue for both of us to take our leave, I think." Kid sketched a quick bow to Shinichi, still grinning. "See you later, meitantei!"

.

True to his word, Kid arrived at the empty warehouse where Shiho and Akemi had been waiting half an hour after Shinichi himself did. Though if the oddly reflective glint of light off a leg of one of the birds roosting in the rafters was anything to go by, the thief had already scouted out the location before actually turning up.

Shinichi would have been surprised if Kid had done otherwise, actually – he certainly would've been suspicious as well if their situations had been reversed, though he had been counting on curiosity to draw Kid out, based on what conclusions he could draw from the Task Force's casefiles.

(Shiho gave him the stink-eye when he whispered _I told you so_ , but he was definitely not imagining the hint of relief in her expression.)

Akemi was the one who moved forward to speak with Kid, who now wore a nondescript outfit and a small backpack, apparently having found the time to stash most of his costume somewhere on the way here. Which presumably meant that he was either still wearing his earlier disguise from the heist, or he simply didn't think any of them were going to be able to discover his identity from his face alone.

Shinichi thought the former was much more likely – you didn't stay uncaught for as long as Kid had by being careless, after all – until the thief walked close enough for both him and Shiho to see his face.

"…why does Kaitou Kid look so much like you, Kudo-kun?" Shiho asked in an undertone, her confusion mirroring his own.

"I have no idea," Shinichi answered, staring at Kid, because Shiho was correct – there were only slight differences in their complexion and eye colour, and he wasn't sure how much of the facial structure could be chalked up to latex prosthetics, but the overall resemblance to himself was singularly striking. "Either he decided to disguise as me on the way here for some bizarre reason, or my parents had another child who just happens to be a magician thief and forgot to tell me. What?" he added defensively at the incredulous look Shiho was giving him. "You don't know my parents, that's actually a perfectly plausible thing that might've happened!"

"I don't know if I'd prefer that to be true or not," Shiho said finally. "But it certainly explains quite a bit about you, at least."

(Shinichi couldn't even bring himself to be offended at that.)

"Oi, meitantei!" Kid chose that moment to call out. "Stop deducing things and come help, some of us would actually like to get home at a reasonable time tonight."

"I didn't know you even _needed_ sleep," Shinichi quipped as he walked over to where Kid was setting up a disguise kit from his backpack, Shiho trailing wordlessly behind him.

"Now, who said anything about sleep?" Kid retorted with the same grin from earlier before turning back to Akemi. "Okay, since you have to apply these disguises yourself I'm afraid they won't be anything particularly elaborate, but I'll see what I can do."

True to his word, Kid worked only with the barest bones of his kit, which still boggled Shinichi with its sheer complexity – even considering that he _was_ related to Kudo Yukiko, who Shinichi was convinced occasionally dressed up for nothing but the fun of it – and after he was done the sisters looked like…

…older versions of Ran and Sonoko, actually, Shinichi couldn't help but think, and it wasn't just because of the hair colour. Kid had focused mostly on Shiho's features, working with latex to hide the sharpness of her brow and cheekbones, and finally producing a pair of oversized glasses that she'd reluctantly put on with a grimace. He'd also worked some gel into their hair, giving Akemi's hair a noticeably messier look while straightening out the recognisable curls of Shiho's.

The thief's skills were impressive, Shinichi had to admit – despite the relative simplicity of the disguises, the pair now looked convincingly like two unremarkable college students rather than half-Japanese (and half-British, Shinichi suspected) sisters. It wouldn't stand up to close scrutiny, even with the addition of coloured contacts and hair dye, but that was a risk they were going to have to take.

"So, how do I look?" Shiho had caught his assessing glance, apparently, her expression still acerbic from behind fake lenses.

…and completely at odds with her suddenly sugary tone, which was more than enough to give Shinichi goosebumps. "Please never, ever, do that again."

"No need to be so serious," Shiho replied with a moue of annoyance, still affecting the same tone, and Shinichi was having the sudden sinking realisation that she was actually _enjoying_ this part.

Kid let out something dangerously close to a giggle, his disguise kit disappearing back into his bag with a snap of his fingers. "Right, I'll be off then. And remember, you _all_ owe me one!"

Shinichi was the only one who spluttered indignantly at that. "But – that – why do _I_ owe you anything?"

"Clocktower heist, meitantei," Kid answered cheerfully, already halfway to the exit. "Or did you forget the part where you fired a gun at me?"

"I fired it _near_ you, idiot thief, there's a difference!" he protested, but Kid merely waved jauntily before vanishing from sight, leaving Shinichi to mutter imprecations under his breath.

"Now _that's_ a story I'd like to hear," Shiho remarked dryly, and Shinichi was too annoyed to be grateful that her tone had dropped back to its usual range.

"Shut up," he grumbled, already deciding that he was going to turn up at Kid's next heist armed with a dozen soccer balls and a tranq gun – because Shinichi didn't aim _at_ something without hitting it, and he was going to make Kid learn that the hard way.

.

The last part of the plan was in Akemi's hands for now, since she apparently had some way of contacting the FBI, though Shiho's expression when she mentioned it pointed at some unpleasant history behind that connection. (Shinichi had no delusions that she'd tell him the truth if he asked about it, though.)

They were back in the lab again, Shinichi drinking the last of the hot coffee he'd bought from a vending machine earlier. "I'd want to stay, you know,"

Shiho gave him another of her inscrutable looks before turning back to her laptop with a shake of her head. "You _would_ do that, wouldn't you."

She had spliced in some old footage to the surveillance feed in order to cover her earlier absence – her weekly lunch with Akemi aside, it wasn't a good idea to draw attention to the irregularity of both sisters being absent for an extended period of time. Shinichi watched her work in silence, and was almost surprised when she continued speaking.

"Well, it can't be helped." She didn't look at him, only tapped a few more keys before closing the laptop and pulling out one of her notebooks instead. "I'm not some high school detective, just a scientist."

The expression on her face as she'd said that was… not quite distant, Shinichi thought, but it was enough to prompt him into standing up and wishing her good night before going to the adjacent break room he'd been sleeping in.

It'd been a long day even by his standards, after all, and they still had more to do tomorrow.

.

Shinichi woke to a strong sense of deja vu.

Or, to be exact, he woke to the piercing glare of morning sun, and the feeling of having being propped up in an uncomfortable position for longer than was advisable.

Other sensations registered one after the other – the unyielding coolness of a wall behind his back, the rubbery numbness in his limbs, the cheerful cacophony of noise in the far background – and all Shinichi could think was _really, this again?_

Which said something about him, probably, but Shinichi didn't bother thinking on that, searching his memory as he waited for feeling to return to his limbs.

His mind still felt a little sluggish, but he was fairly certain that the last thing he remembered was being in the lab with Shiho, which didn't explain why he was apparently at an amusement p–

…hang on. _Amusement park?_ Shinichi thought, wincing at the sun's glare as he looked up. _Don't tell me –_

But yes, that _was_ the distinct shape of the Mystery Coaster, there was no mistaking it.

Shinichi groaned as he slowly manoeuvred himself into a more comfortable position. If he'd had any doubts about Shiho's sense of humour, this certainly dispelled the last of them.

Couldn't she have at least left him nearer to his house?

Because that was what had happened, clearly. Whatever her reasons (if it was anything about keeping him safe, she was being _monumentally stupid_ given that he'd walked right into this mess himself), Shiho had ditched him along with the rest of his plan in Tropical Land, right back where he'd started.

Shinichi should've seen this coming, really. He'd expected it when she'd refused to tell him anything about her plans for after she and Akemi left the country, which made sense if she was trying to avoid making him a liability, but there'd been something _off_ about her attitude even so.

His handphone chose that moment to buzz, and he took it out of his pocket with clumsy fingers, noting that it was fully charged despite the fact that he hadn't even seen it for the past few days.

The screen suddenly went black, but before Shinichi could do more than blink in surprise, white text began to appear, scrolling smoothly past the screen.

 _Meitantei-san: I assume you've figured out what I've done by now. As far as anyone is concerned, I'm dead, and all traces of both my work and your presence here have been destroyed as thoroughly as is practically possible. Do try to keep your head down for a while – I would advise you to do so indefinitely if I thought you'd listen, but keep in mind what could've happened if you had run into anyone else. Some of my erstwhile colleagues may show a brief interest in you after this, though they will likely conclude that I was using you as a distraction to cover my escape attempt._

(And they wouldn't even be wrong about that, Shinichi thought glumly as the text seemed to pause for a moment.)

 _This message will self-destruct after this, so I hope you've been paying attention. Do_ not _look for me, meitantei-san – I'm sure that Watson of yours could provide you with some other mystery to unravel._

Shinichi's eyes narrowed in puzzlement at that last line – his Watson? – but before he could re-read it the entire block of text disappeared along with the black screen, leaving him to stare at his phone's lockscreen, which showed… several dozen missed calls and texts, at least half of them from Ran.

 _I'm okay,_ he texted quickly to both her and Megure-keibu, then brought up a browser window.

Shiho had said that she'd destroyed the evidence thoroughly, which most likely suggested – a fire? Shinichi hazarded a guess, typing several words into the search bar, and was rewarded with several articles about the major explosion of a building matching the approximate location he'd deduced the lab to be at.

He skimmed through the reports quickly, brief as they were. The incident had occurred well past midnight, and preliminary findings appeared to suggest foul play, with the rescue team confirming at least one casualty.

Shinichi leaned his head back against the wall and felt himself shiver slightly, though the aftereffects of the chloroform had long since faded. So Shiho intended to suggest to anyone looking that… she'd attempted to fake her own death, but had accidentally gotten caught up in the blast?

He didn't doubt that the coroner would identify the body accordingly, since a blast of that magnitude would leave very little intact, and Shiho was more than capable of falsifying the necessary evidence – but that left the matter of _where_ the corpse itself had come from, which –

 _You'd go for something cleaner,_ he suddenly remembered himself saying, back at the crime scene where this had all started.

( _Do I not look capable of murder to you?_ Shiho had asked, and Shinichi didn't have any idea how much of this she'd already planned back then – she could have gained access to some sort of morgue, and it was entirely plausible that the lab building itself _had_ one, but on the other hand – )

His thoughts were derailed abruptly when his phone rang, and he pushed himself to his feet before answering. "Ran? I'm at Tropical Land, so – what? No, I'm not quite sure what happened but I'm not injured, there's no need you to come over – "

He didn't know for sure what Shiho had done, but she'd been right about that much: Shinichi wasn't going to look for her, not when it might endanger both her and Akemi's lives, but now that he knew about the Organisation nothing was going to stop him from hunting down the rest of it.

It was what Holmes would've done, after all.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 _...this took a darker turn than expected at the last part? the original ending was completely different, but this suddenly happened and I had to rewrite the entire last third, go figure_

 _as mentioned previously, the plot is not the point here, and there are definitely holes that I haven't patched up – hopefully it makes some semblance of sense at least, but I'm really here for the characters. so have some side notes on our three main players (or rather, two main players and a thief) here:_

 _Shinichi's suspicions in the last section are well-founded – remember, this_ _ **is**_ _Sherry we're talking about here, whose opinion on the value of human life is... questionable at best. what exactly she did is left to your imagination, but her words here are very deliberate: the whole point is to scare Shinichi into realising what she (and by extension, the Org) is capable of, much as Ai does with the fake gun at the hospital._

 _imo Ai's main change over time in canon isn't in personality (hence why Shiho's characterisation here remains fairly similar) but rather in her values/beliefs, which took a one-eighty or so after meeting Conan, and perhaps solving a case here is the first step towards a similar change for Shiho... or perhaps I just couldn't resist including that scene. my kingdom for detective!Shiho, come on._

 _Kaito based the disguises at least in part on Aoko and Keiko, but only had on a minimal disguise himself because he was running low on supplies – he's basically depending on the likelihood that none of them will report him based on this encounter, since they'd have to explain how it happened in the first place. (Jii objected to him turning up at all, obviously, but Kaito can be pretty reckless and soft-hearted when it comes to these things, as we all know.)_


	4. resurgence

_this is the second of two chapters posted today, so make sure you've read the previous chapter first!_

* * *

 _It was dated at midnight of the preceding night and ran in this way:_

 _"MY DEAR MR. SHERLOCK HOLMES,–"_

* * *

 **several months later:**

Shinichi had been returning to the study after getting some juice from the kitchen (he'd wanted coffee, actually, but if Ran got wind of him having that at this hour she'd have his head, and she actually bothered with checking his remaining stocks of coffee grounds so she could tell) when he heard the knocking.

Raising an eyebrow in disbelief, he walked closer to the front door – and yes, there was most definitely someone knocking repeatedly on it, despite the fact that the doorbell right next to the front door was working perfectly fine the last he'd heard it.

A quick check of the peephole didn't show anyone there, but Shinichi opened the door anyway –

"Finally, I've only been knocking for, oh, the past _ten_ minutes, I was just about ready to conclude that they'd gotten you too – why'd you need to install your doorbell so high up anyway?"

– and blinked, looking down, because the owner of that voice was an oddly-dressed kid who was managing to sound even more sarcastic than even Shinichi himself had been at that age.

That was an achievement, considering who he was, but also beside the point.

…what _was_ someone who looked like an elementary schooler doing alone on his front porch at this hour anyway, Shinichi wanted to ask.

Which was when the boy said "Good evening, meitantei," in an _extremely_ familiar diction that was nevertheless a whole _ten years too young_ , and the pieces fell into place in Shinichi's mind with a near-audible clunk.

" – know you're probably not to believe me about this," the kid was saying, looking for all the world like a twin of the seven-year-old version of himself, just dressed in an oversized blue shirt that was so long it almost reached his feet.

(A man's dress shirt and pants, Shinichi realised, only with the sleeves and pant legs folded up until they were about a third their original length. Right. Of _course_.)

He took a moment to sigh at the utter circus spectacle his life had somehow become before stepping back from the doorway. "You might as well come in, this'll probably take a while."

Kaitou Kid – because that was undeniably who he was, except for being actually _kid-sized_ this time (ha ha, Shinichi thought dryly) – cut himself off mid-tirade and blinked up at Shinichi in surprise. "You believe me?"

Shinichi did a quick mental review of Kid's jumbled ramblings in the last three minutes. "This man you mentioned… long blond hair, monochrome outfit, crazy killer eyes?"

Kid nodded warily. "You've met him?"

"I can do you one better, but I don't really feel like standing out here all night," he answered, ushering the kid inside and locking the door behind him – they really needed some other name for Kid, Shinichi thought, even if it wasn't his real one.

(Though a name could wait until he got some better fitting clothes first… perhaps his own clothes from elementary school would work?)

Kid followed him back to the kitchen, swinging himself up onto the counter – the movement surprisingly graceful considering his recent change of size, but then again his physical abilities had always been that of a gymnast's – and Shinichi handed him the untouched glass of juice before going to start a fresh pot of coffee, because he definitely deserved it by this point.

"I know who he is. Well, what his codename is, anyway," Shinichi said as the heavenly aroma of coffee began to fill the room, though he didn't think Kid's sudden and avid interest had anything to do with that. "And I think I know how we can fix your situation. Or try to, at the very least."

Kid drank half the glass of juice in several gulps and set it down on the counter, frowning at Shinichi. "You know about this drug?"

"I know who probably made it, at least." The coffee was still dripping, but Shinichi poured whatever there was into a mug anyway. "But I need to make some calls first. Get yourself some food if you're hungry, there's a loaf of bread and peanut butter in the cupboard."

There was the sound of the stool being shifted, then a cupboard opening and closing as Shinichi walked towards the library.

(He'd been busy at a school event today and hadn't planned on attending the heist, but from what he recalled of the newspaper coverage it had started relatively early in the evening. Somewhere in his rant, Kid had mentioned that he'd run into Gin right after the heist, and assuming that he came straight here afterwards – it was no wonder he was starving, really. Probably exhausted, too, but given his night profession Shinichi didn't think Kid would have much problem functioning even on sleep deprivation.)

Shinichi picked up his handphone from where he'd left it on a table, and dialled a number that he'd since committed to memory. It rang thrice before someone picked up.

"There's been a situation," he said without preamble – there wasn't a need for names, really, since the chances of anyone else having this number were virtually zero. ( _Emergencies only, meitantei-san,_ that particular message had said, in another one of the self-destructing texts that appeared mysteriously on his laptop or phone at random intervals. _And rest assured, I_ will _know if you even try to trace this number._ )

There was a pause before Shiho answered. "What kind?"

"Remember the mouse you mentioned? And your theories about possible effects on people?" He'd found that hard enough to believe back then, and even now with the evidence in front of his eyes… well, _once you eliminate the impossible_ and all that, but this was really stretching it a bit, honestly.

"So it _is_ possible, after all," she murmured half to herself, her spike in interest clearly audible even over the phone. "One of your acquaintances?"

"You're not going to believe this," Shinichi said, to absolutely zero reaction from his audience. "It's Kaitou Kid."

That, at least, garnered some amusement in her reply. "And I suppose he wants the antidote for it?"

"Yes, I'd like that very much, thank you," Kid answered, because he'd somehow snuck in when Shinichi wasn't looking and clambered onto the wingback chair behind him.

(Shinichi would've been more alarmed, except that he'd exhausted his ability to be surprised for the day, and sneaking around _was_ Kid's profession by name, after all.

As it stood, he settled for feeling mildly offended, though if Kid had planted any bugs on him… suffice to say, _someone_ was going to get thrown out of the house, apparent seven-year-old or not.)

"No promises, but I'll see what I can manage. I do owe you quite the favour, after all." Shiho paused. "Until then, you can stay with your Shinichi-niichan, right?"

Shinichi's squawk of protest went unheard under Kid's cheer of "Shinichi-niichan!" with sufficiently childlike enthusiasm that Shinichi couldn't help but wonder if he was going to find the sugar jar half-emptied. Or perhaps the transformation had actually affected Kid's brain more than they'd thought.

" _Traitor_ ," he hissed over the phone back at Shiho, who only chuckled in response.

(…coffee first, hellions later, Shinichi decided, and went back to the kitchen for another mug while Kid ambled along behind him, chattering excitedly.

It was going to be a long night.)

* * *

 **END**

* * *

 _and there you have it – the single longest continuous piece I've written (and will probably ever write, to be honest) in any fandom. which is not very long by most standards, but I'm actually quite proud of myself for sticking with it, and hope you've enjoyed the ride as much as I have!_

 _summary quote again pilfered from ASiB, with apologies to ACD and the dubious justification that there are parallels between them, actually. far be it for me to pretend that I'm any sort of Holmesian myself, but in defense of Irene Adler (later adaptations aside) the character as written by Doyle is more than competent, much as she does not appear onscreen herself – she is first outwitted by Holmes, yes, but turns the tables on him, gets what she wants, and leaves none the worse for it. now, if only she'd appeared more than once..._


End file.
